I picked up a japanese hornbeam at the philadelphia flower show
a little
while ago. it had four branches and a very long leader.. all
full of buds.
i trimmed back the lower branches to a few pairs of buds and
left the
leader alone. It is now pushing lots of new growth... but few
of the buds
on the leader have opened. hornbeams... like most deciduous are
apically
dominant right? all the strong growth on this one appears
lateral and low.

Hornbeams are VERY dominant, epically. However, it seems that it
would be a bit early for a hornbeam to be doing much in your
area -- some of mine down here are just now coming out. They
generally seem to leaf out from the bottom up.

Yours may have been forced for the show, and since you've moved
it to somewhere else, perhaps a cooler area, it may be slowing
down???????

It can happen, however, that a top simply doesn't grow. Keep an
eye on the buds; they'll be the first sign that something is
wrong. Do you know if this tree had been repotted? Excessive
root work -- as in moving the tree from ground to pot -- could
affect the upper part of the tree.

Still, I'd guess things will pop in time.

Jim Lewis - - Tallahassee, FL - Our life is
frittered away by detail . . . . Simplify! Simplify. -- Henry
David Thoreau - Walden

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